Guest Post: 7 Reasons You Shouldn’t Use Seat Covers In Your Living Room

What’s the first thing that comes to mind when you think of seat covers? Probably those plastic tarps draped over the chairs in your grandparents’ house, the ones that stuck to your leg when you sat down and refused to let you find a comfortable position. Sure, they may help extend the life of your furniture by a little bit by keeping spills from sinking in, but seat covers can also be uncomfortable, unsightly and downright impractical.

There are a lot of great ways to keep furniture clean and looking great, so here’s some great advice if you were considering buying seat covers. If you already have them, well, consider this your intervention. Here are the top seven reasons not to use seat covers.

1. They look bad. I’m sorry, but it had to be said. It’s taking the nice, colorful fabric of your chairs and covering it up with the equivalent of a bed sheet. Would you buy a nice new outfit and then drape a giant rain poncho over the entire thing? Probably not. If you want your living room to look its best, spend the time straightening up rather than covering what is supposed to be one of the central points of the room.

2. They encourage you to be dirty. One of the main reasons people use seat covers is to keep the chairs from getting dirt of stains, but covering them often gives less inventive to clean them as often as they need it. Chairs need to be vacuumed regularly to keep out the dirt and dust that can make your air unhealthy, but with a cover on them cleaning this is often neglected.

3. They’re expensive. If you want to avoid putting an ugly sheet over the chair, then the only alternative is to find a custom seat cover for it. Though these may come in many styles, colors and shapes, the price is not exactly cheap. You can save money by just skipping them altogether and instead keeping the original furniture in good shape with regular cleaning and some small repairs as needed.

4. They’re not comfortable. Anyone who has ever sat on a covered chair knows the uncomfortable feeling as it shifts and wrinkles underneath them. The plastic ones are even worse, warming up under bare legs until you basically have to peel yourself out of them.

5. They’re a lot of work. Sticky legs and wrinkles isn’t the only drawback of getting out of a covered seat. They also have a tendency to shift out of position easily, becoming bunched in the middle and pulling up at the bottom, revealing the furniture you were trying to cover. Covered seats need adjustments after every sitting, and when it comes time to clean them the fabric often requires special settings and drying. Some of the more expensive or exotic ones even require dry cleaning.

6. They’re not easy to find. If you want seat covers you have two options—get the material and make them yourself or scour home decorating stores to find the right size. Either way you’re in for a lot of measuring, price comparisons and trial and error as you fit them onto your chairs. If you instead put the same amount of effort into fixing the furniture, you could end up with a sparkling living room and seats that look better.

7. They limit your options. Maybe you don’t spill things on your chairs, and maybe you only need seat covers to extend the life of your old or worn furniture. If that’s the case, then those covers are serving a useful role—but it still doesn’t make them the best solution. Covering up older chairs is the easiest route, but it often keeps you from getting really creative and thinking up better ways to spruce up the room. You could try re-arranging the living room to take attention away from older furniture, installing a new design scheme or buying artwork to become the focus point of the room. Whatever you do, simply covering up the problem is not a great way to deal with it.

Author Bio:Denise Hill is an avid blogger for NetQin, writing on a variety of topics.